UConn football: Edsall, Huskies happy with bowl invitation

STORRS — Just three days after the conclusion of its season, the UConn football team has its ticket punched for bowl season. And the Huskies couldn’t be happier.

With a 9-3 record and a second-place finish in the Big East, UConn will play in the Meineke Car Care Bowl Dec. 29, in Charlotte, N.C., at Bank of America Stadium. Its opponent is a yet-to-be-named team from the Atlantic Coast Conference, which is expected to be announced Sunday.

JOE PEREZ

STORRS — Just three days after the conclusion of its season, the UConn football team has its ticket punched for bowl season. And the Huskies couldn’t be happier.

With a 9-3 record and a second-place finish in the Big East, UConn will play in the Meineke Car Care Bowl Dec. 29, in Charlotte, N.C., at Bank of America Stadium. Its opponent is a yet-to-be-named team from the Atlantic Coast Conference, which is expected to be announced Sunday.

The team, gathered in a meeting room at the Burton complex, heard the bowl’s executive director Will Webb extend the invitation.

“Y’all had a great year,” Webb said via phone. “I think it was just a fantastic finish for a team that has been playing Division I football for such a short time to represent the Big East.”

Since the Huskies’ 66-21 loss to West Virginia on Saturday, a game which cost UConn the conference title, speculation had been rampant regarding which bowl game the team would ultimately find itself participating. Despite its second-place finish in the conference, the Huskies had an identical record to that of South Florida and Cincinnati.

Both teams finished ranked in the Top 25 polls and Cincinnati blew out UConn three weeks ago. After South Florida agreed to play in the Sun Bowl — the most prominent bowl available to a Big East team — it came down to the Huskies and Bearcats.

“I’m just so pleased for the six captains, and really, all the players in this room,” Coach Randy Edsall said. “The one thing you sometimes worry about with the bowls (is) people might not look at your whole season and what you accomplished. I was glad that the Meineke Bowl looked at our total body of work and not just what happened in one half of a game at the end of the season.”

Playing a bowl game in Charlotte, somewhere very accessible to the fan base and players’ families makes the Meineke Car Care Bowl ideal for UConn. For that reason, Edsall said aside from earning the conference’s Bowl Championship Series bid, the game in Charlotte against a fellow BCS conference presented the next-best option.

Landing in Charlotte was important enough to the Huskies that both Edsall and UConn Athletic Director Jeff Hathaway made calls to the bowl committee to pitch the Huskies.

“There were some nerves, some anxious moments,” Edsall said of waiting to hear of the team’s destination. “I think again Jeff did a great job of getting on the phone, I got on the phone to make one call and talk to Will (Webb) and (team and stadium relations director) George Johnson.”

Because of the way the Huskies were dismantled by the Mountaineers in the second half, being outscored 42-7, there was some thought of the Huskies falling to the Papa John’s Bowl in Birmingham, Ala. Had that scenario played out, the Huskies would have likely declined the invitation in favor of playing in Toronto’s International Bowl. While no one associated with the team has said as much, it wasn’t difficult to read between the lines.

“No, we didn’t,” co-captain Dan Davis said of whether the team paid attention to where they were rumored to play. “We talked about it on Sunday. … There were a couple places we didn’t want to go.”

Just then, Edsall told his loquacious lineman not to carry the thought further, to which Davis replied, “We didn’t want to stay here.”

With the opponent not determined, the likely candidates come from Wake Forest, Florida State and Maryland. A win over any of those programs, especially one with the name recognition of Florida State, would provide an immense boost to UConn’s growth as a football program. That said, Edsall isn’t partial to any team. He just wants the win.

“It doesn’t matter who the opponent is,” he said. “Whichever the opponent is, it’s going to be a quality team and we’re going to have to play our tails off and prepare the right way in order to win.”

Hathaway said the university is charged with selling 12,500 tickets and are working to do so through a website, UConnBowl.com. Only tickets purchased though the university and its website will count toward the total.

The Meineke Car Care Bowl will mark the second bowl appearance by the Huskies. UConn defeated Toledo, 39-10, in the 2004 Motor City Bowl. A win in the bowl game will also tie the team record for wins in a season.

Reach Joe Perez at 425-4257 or jperez@norwichbulletin.com

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